Spectrum DNS latency with MG7550 router

Just moved over to Spectrum after moving to a new house. The default cable modem provided had hard-coded the DNS entries, so was unable to use OpenDNS at the router. So I went ahead and purchased a new Motorola MG7550 that would allow me to choose OpenDNS for both Primary and Secondary DNS resolvers. Normal stuff.

After about 20 minutes, name resolution essentially stopped. Was able to connect to the LAN with no issues, but Chrome started throwing the DNS name resolution errors followed by the typical "No Internet detected" although I can see where I was still pulling an IP from the WAN from Spectrum. Appeared to be a latency or timeout issue.

Did a tracert to the OpenDNS servers and it was 16 hops! (Seems excessive). Re-configured to use Spectrum default DNS.....and 6 hops.

Question: Anyone else seeing this sort of behavior of the ISPs making you take the "long road" to get to OpenDNS (or other free DNS providers) thus causing the timeout?